


Stories of Dying

by SeverEstHolmes



Series: Heart and Music [9]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Depression, Other, PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, References to Suicide, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, attempted suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-22
Updated: 2012-10-22
Packaged: 2017-11-16 20:52:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/543701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SeverEstHolmes/pseuds/SeverEstHolmes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Watson returns from combat in Afghanistan completely alone - with little family whom he can turn to, and no real friends or acquaintances; his life is a completely miserable one...<br/>Oneshot, Part 9 in the "Heart & Music" Series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stories of Dying

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own Sherlock Holmes or anything else that the great ACD created. I also hold no rights over the BBC adaptations and additions of characters!

_'So hard the fight can be to face,_

_Your mind will tell you it shall never be won._

_The darkness may blind and the weight crush you with its embrace,_

_Don't give up til the battle is done.'_

_T'clack! T'clack! T'clack!_

Something was rattling in the hallway next to John's room and he was vaguely aware of it in his psyche, but it was not a pressing bother on his mind. The clicking had blended smoothly with the memory that was replaying in horrific technicolour in John's mind as though it was actually occurring right before his eyes. Memories, flashes, triggers and pain. Asleep or awake, neither mattered because it followed him everywhere, and haunted and ripped at him. If only that bullet had been three more inches to the left then he wouldn't be having to live through this agony... How he wished that bullet had penetrated his heart and cut away his whole life. Being dead sounded like a dream in comparison to the ghostly life that he was now existing through... He wouldn't have to fill the dull ache and guilt that was inside of him if that bullet had been to the left. He wouldn't have to now go about in a world in which he no longer had a proper place, if that bullet had been to the left. If only... that bullet could have solved everything by being three inches further across. Instead it had left a broken picture... The glass was cracked, but he wished it had been shattered fully.

The return to civilian life was jarring; even more so than usual because John hadn't wanted to leave. He was still a soldier, he wasn't ready to go back to being a civilian – he still wanted to be out there tending to the injured and looking after the sick, but that bullet had changed everything and taken away his choice. He didn't want to be in a box-sized one bedroom flat in the east side of London. He didn't want the crushing pain that afflicted his shoulder, and refracted through the rest of his body. He didn't want to use that cane. He wanted to be in Afghanistan – doing his job, saving and protecting lives. It was the essence of who he was... Dr. Watson was a soldier.

Life as a civilian was a monotonous one. Every single aspect of it seemed to bring an annoyance to John, at every turn it seemed that something reminded him of a situation of warfare... and one that he could have had some way of intervening to a good end. It was completely pointless, the whole charade that he was affecting. He was a lone man, with only a drunken sister for relatives; with no real hopes of obtaining a job, frequent appointments with his therapist because of recurrent memories of Afghanistan which were a result of apparent Post Traumatic Stress Disorder... He had no friends, no one to call upon, no reason to stay alive. These thoughts dogged his mind continually – if he could not be a soldier then he was good for nothing else, he was stripped of everything that made him a man; of everything that kept him alive.

He had been in London for only a month and a half living out this non-existence; and it was now too much for him to ever imagine a recovery from the state he was living in. He could not cope with it for another day: he desired it to end, immediately.

He lay awake on his bed, staring upwards and recounting flashes of happier times with his mates in the battalions. He was so numb that they hardly made a dent on the firm blackness that had settled upon his mind – if even those did not serve to make him feel a little more worthy then nothing ever would. It was time for this to end. Never in his life had he expected to come to a situation where he would contemplate suicide, but as he swung his legs round the edge of the bed and placed them on the wooden floorboards it was the only option that he could possibly consider... He wished that bullet had torn through his heart rather than his shoulder; there was no dishonour in death on the battlefield. The dishonour would come from his death in a small cardboard-box of a flat in London, away from the fighting. But Harriet didn't have enough in her brain to feel the dishonour that it would cause, the alcohol had made it impossible for her mind to focus or function for more than a couple of seconds. She wouldn't miss him, it would hardly impact her.

He had a list – from the top to the bottom of ways in which he could make it end. He had his gun, but that would mean staring into the trigger of the gun as he unloaded the barrel into his forehead. Was he brave enough to do that? Or there was the stack of pills – he had been saving a supply of cocodamol. If he dosed himself with them and with enough paracetamol and whisky then he might just achieve what he wanted... It would be like falling asleep, just permanently.

His foot dragged slightly across the floorboards, bearing as a constant reminder as to why this was the only viable option left, as he crossed the room to the desk. Pulling the drawer open he located and lined up on his desk the twelve cocodamol tablets and an entire packet of paracetamol, then he proceeded to pour his best whisky into his glass and fill a pint glass with water. If these were to be his last moments then he wanted them to be as ordered and precise as they deserved to be.

He slammed down the pint glass onto his desk top and took a shuddering breath. It was done. Now all that was left was to wait and the results would come finally. Whisky glass in one hand, he limped back across the room and perched upon the edge of the bed; at least he didn't have to worry about pain any more. He didn't have to worry about disappointing anyone, or being a burden. As he felt himself relaxing, as his breathing smoothed out and his eyelids became so heavy that he could not force them apart any longer, he was reminded of the mates he had lost before... George, Darren and Mikey. He was going to join them, that's all this was – a journey to them. Although they had disembarked trying to save others, or maintaining the hold for civilians; John had followed because he was no longer able to do those things. He couldn't keep his eyelids open any longer, he had slumped back into the mattress of his bed and was no longer aware of the  _'T'clack'_ noise, or that it had been getting steadily louder.

"John? Dr. Watson?"

Bright, blurred flashes of light swum in front of John's eyes in a hazy, disconsolate manner. There was a firm grip of hands on his shoulders, causing immediate pain in his right shoulder where the bullet had penetrated, and was conscious that he was on his side resting on a hard surface. Pain like he couldn't believe was firing through every nerve and cell in his body; he was barely aware of the people around him or what they were doing to him. If this was where you went after death, then John suddenly wished he could be back. He had a vague awareness of being lifted and carried, and he remembered being in a paroxysm of pain and wasn't quite sure whether he had vomited or imagined feeling like he had.

It could have been twenty minutes, or it could have been hours but the first thing that he was able to truly feel was something on his hand. His head was pounding in a reoccurring rhythm, and the world around him felt soft. He was in a bed, but not his own bed – and all around him was white. Prising his eyes open he was in a hospital room, with a very dilapidated looking but sober Harriet beside his bed, and his therapist at the end of the bed. The expressions on their faces were of pity, horror and worry – it was clear that they knew what he had just done.

He had failed.

**Author's Note:**

> And as ever- I would love to know what you think: whether I should continue, or hang up my writing gloves forevermore!


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